smiled then, and Jace was pretty sure it was about the prettiest smile he’d ever seen. Fitzgerald eyes, about the only thing she had in common with her uncle Sean and her sister Lizzie.
“Melonie?” Heath started forward. “Gosh, it’s great to see you. Lizzie will be over the moon that you’re here. And this big guy—” Heath set his hand on the five-year-old’s head “—is my son, Zeke.”
“We’ve met over the computer.” Lizzie’s sister bent to the boy’s level and offered him a sweet smile. “But you’re even more handsome in real life, Zeke Caufield.”
Zeke grinned, clearly charmed in less time than a foolish man takes to ride a rodeo bull. Heath clapped the boy on the back and laughed. “Lizzie’s at the horse stables, but she’ll be right along. How are you?” he asked as the woman stepped forward and gave him a hug.
“Ask me in twelve months when I can take my career off hold,” she told him. She lifted her eyebrows toward the beautiful horse stables just west of the graveled parking area. “If I live that long. You know me and horses—we learned the hard way to stay clear of one another and that’s not about to change. Sakes alive, Heath.” She gazed around and her eyes softened with appreciation. Her voice drawled now, a nod to the woman’s Southern roots. Funny there was no trace of that drawl when she’d stopped at Jace’s place. “This has got to be the back door to nowhere, isn’t it? And yet... It’s real pretty in its own Western way.”
Back door to nowhere?
Jace hung back, purposely.
He knew her kind, all right. The sort that kept themselves separate, disparaging the dawn-to-dusk hard work on a spread like this. The kind of woman that found down-home ranching beneath them. His family had helped settle this town. They’d built homes, dug wells and arranged for schooling and libraries, and they’d done it all expecting nothing in return except a chance to grow a town worth living in, so he not only respected the work that went into this town. He admired it.
“Jace.” Heath motioned him over and it would be rude to stand still. Rude...but tempting, nonetheless. He rebuffed the temptation and crossed between the vehicles. “Jace, this is Lizzie’s sister, Melonie. Mel, this is my friend and right-hand man, Jace Middleton.”
“Mr. Middleton.” She drawled his name out with all the pomp of a modern day Scarlett O’Hara and if that didn’t spell trouble with a capital T, then nothing did. “It is a pleasure to make your official acquaintance.”
“Mine, too, ma’am.” He extended his hand. She met his gaze, straight on, then took his hand. The strength of her grip surprised him but he refused to show it. “Glad you found your way. Eventually.”
“As am I.” He was pretty sure the Southern drawl was all for his benefit because it disappeared when Lizzie came running across the grass from the stables.
“Melonie!”
“Lizzie!” They hugged and laughed and at that moment he couldn’t resent her because he knew what it was like to have family love.
You knew it, you mean.
He choked down a sigh. He started for the baler, wishing things were different. He wished the town’s economy hadn’t started to nose-dive two decades back when no one bothered looking. Wished he wasn’t the last Middleton in a town built by Middletons.
But he was, and there were no two ways about it. Jace was going to do the one thing he hated to do. He was going to leave Shepherd’s Crossing and all his family had built over the years. Built...and lost.
He yanked his cowboy hat onto his head and fired up the baler. He’d longed for a chance to set things right, to make a name for himself in his hometown, but that wasn’t about to happen now.
So be it.
He’d do whatever it took to help his kid sister, Justine, get the start she deserved, and to make his way in the world. Even if it meant changing up the old house. He pushed the thoughts aside as he maneuvered the big machine out of the equipment barn to gas it up.
Lizzie’s sister looked up. Not at him, but beyond him. Something marked her gaze. Something shadowed and maybe even sad as her eyes swept over the beautiful ranch with a long, slow look. A look that indicated she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She righted her features before she turned back toward Lizzie, but then she saw him looking her way.
Her gaze narrowed. Her mouth did, too. But the face she showed Lizzie two seconds later was warm and genuine.
Only it wasn’t, and right now Jace Middleton was pretty sure only he and Melonie Fitzgerald knew that.
Sparse population, drastically cold winters and a herd of horses probably waiting to trample her senseless.
What on earth was Melonie Fitzgerald doing in western Idaho, when she’d been on the verge of contracting her own home-design TV show?
She knew the answer. Her father. He was a major publishing owner/executive who’d brought down his company, his home and his three daughters when he diverted millions in cold, hard cash into overseas accounts...then followed it there.
She didn’t do ranches. She steered clear of horses for good reason. And when her long-term boyfriend realized she was not only broke, but also in a mountain of debt, he’d dumped her like a hot potato fresh out of the coals.
Yet here she was, fulfilling the terms of a bequest on her late uncle’s ranch when she should have been on camera, filming the pilot episode of Shoestring Southern Charm.
Girl, you make the best of every situation. If it gets dark, you light a candle. If it gets cold, start a fire, or warm a room with your smile. A smile goes a lot further than a frown.
Corrie’s words. Succinct and true, always dependable. She turned to ask Lizzie about their nanny/surrogate mother, but caught the cowboy’s gaze instead.
He was hot. Not big-city hot, either. Country hot, with his long-sleeved blue thermal shirt, dark blue jeans and a to-die-for real cowboy hat. The black hat showed off his bronze skin and made him look even more rugged, if such a thing was possible.
He’d duped her over the directions.
After you treated him like a back-road hick.
She winced because she’d iced him and she wasn’t usually like that. But four years of running part of the magazine’s corporate office had affected her. She faced her sister. “Where’s Corrie?”
“Up the drive visiting Rosie and the baby.”
Was Melonie supposed to have a clue what she meant? Because she didn’t.
Lizzie took her arm as the good-looking cowboy busied himself with a fairly monstrous piece of machinery. “You’ll get to know folks quick enough. There are a lot of nice people here, Mel.”
Mel locked eyes with her. “There are nice people everywhere. Doesn’t mean I intend to live there. You know me. This isn’t exactly my thing.”
“And on that note.” Heath slipped an arm around Lizzie, kissed her, then bumped his forehead to hers. “I’ll be back tomorrow. Love you.”
Lizzie
